Lancashire nostalgia in 1976: Sex ban, motorway mattress and council dig a hole for themselves

Here's a look at some of the stories that were making the headlines back in 1976:

Lancashire folk prove not to be prudish when it comes to sex

Lancashire’s seaside hotels are “licensed for extra-marital sex” - or at least it seems so.

For not one hotelier spoken to by the “Post” would consider asking customers for proof of marriage before they booked in double rooms.

“It’s a damned cheek,” said one.

The idea that couples - young and old - should provide marriage identification has come from a York hotelier who is fed up with unmarried holidaymakers making his premises “just one step away from a brothel.”

The last straw came recently when one Australian turned up with three women to stay the night and had not decided which one was to be his “wife” that night.

However, Lancashire folk are more inclined to turn a blind eye to gambolling in the guesthouses and a spot of hanky panky in the hotels.

At Southport, one hotelier said: “It’s a damned cheek. It’s certainly not normal procedure for us to ask anybody to prove that they are married.

“You can usually tell when a couple isn’t married anyway.”

The reaction from Mr Tony Cowburn, joint director of the St Ives Hotel, Lytham St Annes, was: “Whoever is putting up this idea of guests presenting hoteliers with their marriage certificates to prove they are Mr and Mrs is wasting his time.”

A Preston family had a rude awakening when a flying mattress smashed their car windscreen on the M6 motorway.

Telephone engineer Mr John Coward, his wife Hilary, son Michael, four, and niece Lisa Tomlinson, eight, were travelling to the Lakes when they were disturbed on their motorway outing north of Carnforth.

Mr Coward said he was travelling behind a Cortina.

“I had seen the Cortina, with the bed on the roof rack travelling in front of us,” said Mr Coward.

“Suddenly a strong wind got underneath it and blew it straight back towards us.

“I smalled on the brakes but I didn’t dare serve. Fortunately the base of the bed flew to the side but the mattress smashed through the windscreen and then blew on over the top.”

Lamps reveal cracks in system

Have you heard the one about the council that re-surfaced a pavement before the new lamp-posts had been wired up?

It might sound like a joke but that is exactly what happened in Preston when a newly laid path got the pick and shovel treatment almost as soon as the new tarmac was dry.

When Norweb workmen arrived in Sizer Street they took one look at the freshly laid footway then set to work digging a hole right through the middle of it.

“The alternative would have been to leave the lights without cables,” said a spokesman for Norweb.

“Normally we have very good relations with the local authority but something went wrong this time.”

A Preston Council officer said that they had asked Norweb to do the job in November of 1975.